Alone Together
by calma-llama
Summary: AU where Yumi's parent's marriage falls apart and she is forced to move back to Japan with her father. Ulrich is forced to come to terms with the situation.


Ulrich watched her silently. His head was tilted in one direction, his eyebrow in another. A look of incredible puzzlement plastered itself across his usually stoic features. She had a rather strange habit of rendering him speechless. But, that was usually when she was speaking to him in the gentle voice of hers or gracefully kicking Xana's ass. Once, just once, she had done it by nearly kissing him, which pretty much made him a nervous wreck around her.

But she never did it like this. Never as quietly and motionless as she was now.

He swallowed several times, searching desperately for his voice, which he'd seemed to have misplaced somewhere deep down in his soul. His throat felt dry and his stomach seemed to have tied itself into a knot that he couldn't, for the life of him, undo. His palms were sweaty and his blood had turned to ice. Overall, the feeling boggled his mind.

And she was quiet. So quiet.

Her knees were pulled up underneath her chin and her arms, covered by the black fabric of her clothing, wrapped themselves tightly around her bent legs. Her shoulders were hunched over in a defeated position that looked simply bizarre on the prideful, perfect posture she usually held. Strands of her dark hair swayed in the tender breeze.

Ulrich stood there and examined her for what felt like forever, but was probably a mere minute in reality. He was baffled and unsure. It made him uneasy seeing her like this, well, actually the whole situation made him sick to his twisted stomach. She was always so strong, mature, and not to mention the voice of reason. But here, right at this very moment, Yumi seemed so...Beaten. So lost. So vulnerable. It was something completely unfamiliar and, honestly, just disturbing.

A sudden wave of guilt washed over him. Like he was laughing at her and pointing out her flaws in her moment of weakness. He was sure that she wouldn't want anyone, especially one of her closest friends, to see her broken like this. With that, Ulrich turned to leave, scooping up the pieces of his shattered heart to bring along with him. He couldn't believe this was happening. To him...To her. He had made the mistake of standing there instead of leaving the moment the words escaped her lips.

"Don't go...Please."

Her voice wavered, yet carried the same pressing tone as it always did. Even in her battered state, she knew she was a leader, not only of their group, but of her family. But, it wasn't a command. A command would have frustrated Ulrich, as it usually did. It was a plea...Maybe even her way of begging.

He relented and turned back around to face her. Her back was still to him.

"I'm really sorry."

Wow, is that really the best you can do?

He berated himself in the back of his head, cringing. His best friend was going through a teenage crisis and that was all he could say? "You know what I like most about you, Ulrich? Your rich vocabulary!" He remembered her saying sarcastically. He'd take her playful teasing over this any day.

"You...You don't have to stay." She shook her head, apologizing. This time, she looked at him, their dark eyes meeting for the first time of their conversation. The cloudy eyes he had grown so fond of, he'd never know how much he loved the color black till he met this girl, held immense anguish. Agony beyond her years pooled in the form of tears. He felt his already shattered heart break once more. He wished he could do something, anything, just to get a glimpse of that rare, yet beautiful smile.

The feeling vanished when she did offer him a smile, the corners of her lips curling upwards deliberately made to look believable. She failed miserably. He knew her better than that. That grin couldn't cover up what she was really feeling.

Alone.

She was hurting. It made his heart shatter a million times over, his lungs burn and his soul ache.

"You don't have to stay." She stated again. Her voice trembled as she stated the blatant lie.

He took a seat beside her on her bed, the full understanding nailing him like a punch to the stomach. Yumi, the girl he had fallen in love with, was moving to Japan and never coming back. She was leaving school, her friends and Lyoko behind.

She was leaving him behind too.

He sighed, observing the packed suitcases that surrounded them. "I would have to disagree with that." He said slowly, miraculously regaining his will to speak coherent words. "I have to stay. You're...My best friend." _Just my best friend? I don't think so. _"I can't leave you alone like this. We can be...Alone together."

She gave him a questionable look.

"It makes sense if you don't think about it too much."

"I don't want you to go. I don't want to be alone." She whispered. The grip on her sleeves tightened and she buried her face into the fabric. Ulrich watched, silently awestruck by the strength of this young teenage girl. Here she was, being relocated to Japan with one of her two parents and being forced to move away from her only friends as she called them. Her world was crumbling around her and yet she stood. She was stubborn, ill tempered and sometimes even a little brash...

But she was strong. She was amazing, though he'd come to know that long ago.

"Thank you." She stated. "For giving me the chance to be alone together with you."

"Um, yeah." He blushed, his cheeks burned in a way he just couldn't describe. It was incredibly embarrassing, but he couldn't help it. "It's the least I could do...I mean..." He rummaged for anything in that vocabulary she teased him so much about. He wanted to comfort her. To let her know she still had him in the ruins of the world she called life. But he couldn't. His mind was maddeningly blank.

For a long time, he just looked at her, brown eyes level with black. In the ray of moonlight that crept in through her window, her skin seemed a shade paler, though the toll of her emotions seemed unbearable.

"Look, Yumi..." He made another attempt, running a hand nervously through unkempt brown hair. "I wish I could go with you, more than anything I've ever wished for...It's just...I'm not exactly a word person." He took a breath, unsure about how to continue, or rather, if he should continue. "I mean...I'm more of an action guy. You, Odd, Jeremie and Aelita should know that better than anyone. My forte is attacking the enemy, not making conversation. I'm sorry...I just don't know...I mean...I-I don't think..." Ulrich growled in frustration. How could his usually bold, wisecrack mouth fail him now of all times? "Look, I'm just trying to say that I'm not exactly the first person you'd want to comfort you, okay?"

She chuckled, shaking her head. "You being here is comforting enough." Seeing that smile on her lips made him shudder. Why did this girl have the power to do this to him? Wasn't his heart already broken enough? "I feel that I am obligated to be strong around others. You know, because I'm the oldest or something like that. But I can be the real Yumi around you. And I think the real Yumi is a lot weaker than I'd like to admit."

He held her gaze, losing himself to those dark eyes. The very eyes that had a wet, teary shine to them. Slowly, he placed a hand on her cheek, examining her as she froze up ever so slightly. He leaned in and finished what they had started on Lyoko that one faithful day. He pressed his lips gently to hers. Her lips fitting perfectly to the contours of his mouth and as she kissed him back, he savored her taste.

This was all he had to remember her by. Her confident spirit, her unmatchable radiance and now...The sweet taste of her lips. This was Yumi Ishiyama. This was the beautiful yet deadly geisha he had fallen in love with.

He pulled back and realized that hot tears ran down her cheeks.

It made him ache.

He wiped away the tears lightly. "I told you, I'm an action kind of guy." He gave a humorless laugh, sliding his hand down to hers and entwining their fingers. She gave a short cry, a sob long locked away, and buried her face into his chest, finally breaking down, releasing pent up emotions that have been begging to be realized.

And he held her tightly.

Her final night contained a lot of crying, kissing and to Ulrich's surprise, words.

Ulrich let himself break down as he watched her, waving goodbye for the last time. She was still hurting. It made his heart shatter, his lungs burn and his soul ache all over again.

The morning after, he awoke in a tangle of emotions and somewhat drowning in his own tears. He remembered that half smile she'd give him, the one that made his stomach do back flips.

He missed being alone together with her.


End file.
